


Time to Cherish

by orchidbreezefc



Category: Dangan Ronpa, Dangan Ronpa 3: The End of 希望ヶ峰学園 | The End of Kibougamine Gakuen | End of Hope's Peak High School
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, M/M, attempted suicide, kind of a fix it in that juzo gets to confess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-20 12:47:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8249644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orchidbreezefc/pseuds/orchidbreezefc
Summary: In which Munakata isn't too late to come to the control room, but is still too late in the end.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Do we still read control room fics? Is that still a thing? To be fair I would have posted this a lot earlier if my computer hadn't been out of commission. But then maybe it would have suffered from the lack of tweaks I did in that time. So maybe it balances out?
> 
> Shout out to Helen for being perfect as always and blubbering her way through the first draft of this on Skype guinea pig style. I hope the finished version is just as satisfying :D
> 
> Also, guess who has two thumbs and a Dangan Ronpa only blog! Check it out at autisticsystemizuru.tumblr.com!

Adrenaline has never felt to Munakata like it flows through his veins. It's more like buzzing, spikes of energy through his whole body spurring him forward. It feels like panic, but more physical; it _is_ panic right now. The sense of urgency is a sickening swirl of mental, physical, and emotional.

The bangle falls away as he runs. He registers that it must have been powered by the building, and it must be Sakakura who removed it--it means that he's alive, whatever concerns Naegi had about his condition, and he's given Munakata access to him. Munakata feels, though, that he would have broken apart any wall separating them if he'd had to, sliced the door in half and tried his luck to see whether that counted as opening it.

There's so much blood when Munakata arrives that at first his heart goes in his throat, thinking there's been a fight because surely one person couldn't produce all this, and even if they could, not _Sakakura_ , please no. But of course everyone else is dead, so it must be from him, from the wound Munakata caused with his own hands--his whole world lurches but he keeps going, his feet only stuttering to the side a little before he's there in the doorway.

It's dim from the emergency lights. There's a bloody hand-shaped smear on the wall like someone fell against it and slid to the floor, which is exactly where the unmistakeable hunched figure is, maybe six feet off. Sakakura.

Munakata heaves air in and out of his lungs; the oxygen doesn't feel like it's reaching the rest of his body. He drops his katana with a clatter halfway over to Sakakura's side, desperately pushing his hair out of his face and searching for any sign of life. He wipes blood from Sakakura's mouth and waits to feel breath on his fingers, his own breath stilling in the painfully long few seconds it takes him to determine that there is no movement. 

Tears begin to spill hot from his eye. Too late, too damn late. God, he's such a fool. This is all his fault, and all he can do is grate out a whisper of "I'm sorry." First Chisa, now this. Munakata has found in himself an incredible ability to destroy everything he holds dear.

It feels like blasphemy to touch Sakakura, somewhere between desecrating something holy and being flippant with a horror he created, but he tilts their foreheads together and lets his tears run down onto Sakakura anyway. That he could ever mistrust Sakakura of all people, who died trusting him--died thinking he was forever abandoned, and will never know otherwise. Munakata curses himself, curses fate, curses his convictions for being stronger than his love. 

He can't live with this. He doesn't deserve to live with this. There's nothing left for him. All at once he knows what he has to do and pulls away, forgetting to continue crying in the sudden rush of determined action, though his tears make his movements into a clumsy flurry. Munakata's hands grope for his katana and he begins to fumble at the buttons of his shirt. He sheds it halfway so it falls away from his chest and stomach, his arms still in his sleeves. 

He fights for steadiness as he holds his katana at arm's length with its tip trembling against the skin just below his navel. He can't get it to stop drawing tiny circles. He always thought of seppuku as a useless tradition, suicide a waste if not a weakness, but how can he go on? Without Sakakura, without Chisa? He can't force himself to look at Sakakura; he doesn't deserve to look upon what he's done. Atonement, honor, a sign of some god damn respect for Sakakura and Chisa is all that's left. Munakata gulps and tightens his clammy grip. 

On his hands come the firm downward press of a wet clump of fabric and he yelps in surprise and drops the katana entirely. Yet, even soaked and sticky, he would know the fabric of that jacket anywhere. 

Sakakura retracts his arm, staring at him intently, if groggily. "Munakata," he slurs, "You fucking idiot."

Munakata forgets everything else and throws his arms around him with a wrenching sob of "Sakakura!" Sakakura winces but wraps his arm around him in return, the hand on the lever still too stiff to move.

"God, I thought... you were..." Munakata whimpers, then with an enormous effort pulls himself together and leans back far enough to look Sakakura in the face. "Thank god," he says, one hand stroking Sakakura's face. Some of the color returns to it, presumably the process of blood flowing and breath working again. Munakata smiles, wobbly but genuine in his relief. "Let's get you out of here."

Sakakura's brow furrows and he coughs, then shakes his head. The words come through slow and heavy with effort, his diaphragm probably injured from munakata's sword wound. "No... no, I don't think that's... gonna happen." 

Munakata blinks, then grits his teeth. After all this, Sakakura really wants to just give up? "Nonsense." He begins to loosen Sakakura's hand from the lever. "You're going to come out of here with me."

"That... an order?"

"It's--that's--" Munakata frowns, somehow aggravated that suddenly Sakakura isn't going along with him as he always does. "Well, you'd better damn do it in any case."

"Was never so good... at followin' through on orders. Now fucking things up for you... that I was good at."

"Sakakura," Munakata reprimands sharply. Perhaps he should say something softer, something more reassuring, but he's still shaking with nerves and fear. Sakakura laughs weakly, then coughs painfully. The sound rasps with blood, like mucus in the throat. He goes silent as Munakata continues working his hand off the lever, then manages to get it free and hold it down in his lap. He can't tell if Sakakura's thinking or--his breath catches in his chest--if he's going to pass out and that will be the last of it--

"'m sorry."

Munakata can't believe his ears. Well, yes he can, Sakakura would apologize if he made a mistake in Munakata's dreams, but really, now of all times? "Sakakura," he says, clasping his one hand determinedly in both of his. "If anyone needs to apologize, it would be me. I abandoned you, and hurt you, and I'll never forgive myself as long as I live." There are so many more apologies to make, but he will have time later.

Sakakura shakes his head and waves his free arm in tired dismissal--Munakata follows the movement with his eye, deeply pained by the sight of the stump. "That shit doesn't matter now. I just--" he looks down at their hands. "Ain't got a lot of time left, so I just wanted you to know... sorry for everything. For fucking up so much. For Enoshima." His hand would be curling into a fist were Munakata not holding it, he can tell. "I knew about her... I _knew_ , but--"

"Naegi told me," Munakata says, his voice as soft as he can make it, rubbing his thumb over Sakakura's wrist. "She blackmailed you. She was worse than we knew; I don't blame you for any of it. We couldn't have known."

Sakakura grits his teeth, leaning harder against the control panel. "I was weak.... I--I was scared." He pauses and looks away, his head resting with a clunk on the panels of the wall. "'m still scared." 

Scared to die? Munakata wonders, his stomach twisting. He twines their fingers together and holds as tight as he can. "It's going to be okay," he murmurs. "I'm here," he adds, because at least he should offer something Sakakura will believe.

Sakakura nods and looks at their hands again. Munakata's eye slides to Sakakura's other arm. "I can't believe you did that," he whispers. Sakakura jolts like he's forgotten, even though it must still be terribly painful. "I can't believe you would do that to save us."

"Us," Sakakura scoffs. "There were never any 'us'es, Munakata." He shifts in discomfort and pain. "There was never even a me," he says quietly. 

"What do you mean?" Munakata says apprehensively, not sure he wants to hear the answer.

Sakakura manages to even look at him as he says it, though his eyes are clouded with pain and encroaching death. "Do I have to--kh--spell it out, Munakata? There's just you. There was only ever you."

Munakata's heart skips a beat. "D-don't be ridiculous. Of course there's an us. There always has been." Chisa too, he feels too choked to mention.

"Not for me," Sakakura says.

The moment passes back and forth between them. They both inhale deeply to steady themselves.

"Sakakura, if I ever made you feel as though--"

"I love you."

Silence. Munakata's mouth opens and closes. Sakakura looks away for a long moment but is the one to speak first, like he always is. "It's the end, so it doesn't... matter if I say it, right? She can't... get to us anymore."

Everything clicks. The blackmail, it had been--this? That long ago? "All these years?" Munakata whispers, not trusting his voice to stay steady any louder.

Sakakura looks up at him and nods, some sheepishness in his demeanor. As if he's afraid Munakata's going to be _mad_. As if he could be, with him like this, both cold and horribly wounded and together. 

"Sakakura, I'm... I'm so sorry." It's a heartfelt apology, and he hopes Sakakura understands it's for more than this; it's for all of it, for all those years, for the betrayal and the sheer _blindness_. It's for the failures; for the audacity Munakata had in thinking that Sakakura would follow into despair, would ever follow anything but him; and especially for how it ended.

Because--he cannot deny it any longer--Sakakura will die here. Tears begin to stream once more from Munakata's eye. Sakakura inches closer; Munakata can't tell if it's affectionate, some drive for comfort, or if he's merely trying to escape the cold creeping in on him. Nonetheless he pulls Sakakura close and Sakakura tilts his head against his shoulder.

"It was worth it," Sakakura says, ponderously, almost dreamily. "For you to live."

The bottom drops out of Munakata's stomach. How could he think--? He can't truly believe that. "No," he says. He's shaking and can't bring himself to say more.

"She... said she'd die for you... you know? That she could. I think... me too."

Thinking of Chisa sacrificing herself intentionally too--it's like a twist of the knife. "Don't say such horrible things," Munakata mumbles, his vision blurring so horribly he can hardly make out the insignia on Sakakura's coat. He strokes Sakakura's hair, awash in stomach-tearing regret. This is the last moment they'll ever have, and he can't even cherish it because it's so horrible. All the memories he will ever be able to remember with any kind of fondness, of both them and Chisa, are behind them, and he never even _knew_.

He would trade places in an instant, of course he would--but no, that would be selfish, wouldn't it? To leave Sakakura alone. Ready to take his own life just minutes ago--precious, painful fucking _minutes_ \--he realizes now it was the easy way out, to avoid living with what he's done. And Sakakura wants him to live, wants it so badly he did all of this.

"I'll live for you, Sakakura," he whispers into Sakakura's hair. "I'll do it." He squeezes his hand. "You can be my hope."

Finally Sakakura tilts back so he can see Munakata again. He tries to smile, Munakata thinks, but he's so weak now and he's shaking and his eyelids keep fluttering, threatening to close forever, and Munakata just _aches_.

Maybe it's that ache, maybe it's Sakakura's fading, delirious consciousness, but somehow Munakata has leaned down or Sakakura has leaned up and their lips brush, just that, just brush.

Munakata's not sure if Sakakura hears his whispered "I love you too," but he is sure that by the time he leans back, he's dead.

**Author's Note:**

> They don't get to say each other's first names because it echoes Chisa and I'm _evil_.


End file.
